Time to Travel - Ataru's Chance at Freedom
by Henthorne
Summary: Urusei Yatsura's Ataru is sick of living with Lum's insane control and he wants out. When Lum drops her portable time travel device he sees a way to get free, but time travel is tricky and Ataru finds out things are not exactly the way he thinks they are.
1. Chapter 1

**To tomo ni ikiru Lamu**

**(Life with Lum)**

Outside Ataru's room, bare tree limbs rattled in the winter wind. Kotatsu-neko, the man-sized ghost-cat, huddled under the foot warmer, staying warm, while Lum, the bikini-clad-cutie with green hair and a predilection for tiger-stripes, lounged on her rug reading a magazine and sipping from a bottle of orange pop. Ten, Lum's spaceship-flying baby cousin in a tiger-striped diaper, levitated above, reading the magazine over Lum's shoulder. Ataru lay on his futon, staring at the ceiling. If he concentrated hard enough he could make to third stain from the far corner look like a girl without her top. Ataru concentrated on this for minutes on end. It took talent, he thought.

"Darling," said Lum, "Are you staring at the stain again, tcha?"

"Y-yes?" Ataru answered.

"Stop it. You know I don't like it when you flirt, 'tcha"

Ataru growled in frustration. "It's a stain," he shouted. "It's just a stain. How can I possibly flirt with a stain?"

Ten floated to the futon and looked down into Ataru's crimson face.

"The only thing you have to do is look at a stain? You are a big loser."

"Shut up, you little jerk." Ataru grabbed Ten's hand and knocked the little alien on his head.

Ten retaliated, blowing flames at Ataru's face.

"Aie! Aie! Aie!" shouted Ataru. "Stop him! He's a pyromaniac."

"Serves you right, tcha.." Lum sat up. "He's just a baby, tcha."

Ataru let go of Ten's arm to wipe the smoke from his face and Ten took advantage of his freedom to swim back to Lum and hide behind her shoulders.

"He's not a baby!" shouted Ataru. "He flies spaceships and reads and, and... he flies! He tried to burn me alive!"

"No! I'm a good boy," protested Ten.

Ataru leaped off his futon, grabbing for Ten. Lum reached out her hands to intercept him and Ten swam away. As Lum's hand touched Ataru's shoulders she let out an amazing electrical shock.

"Darling, you idiot!" she shouted.

Ataru shuddered and jolted in place for a half minute, then, when Lum let go, fell limp to the floor.

"Uuuu-uhnnnnghhh!" moaned Ataru.

Ten giggled. Ataru raised himself up on his elbows. His brown hair stood in a frazzled electrified afro and whisps of smoke curled from his ears. "Ah! I wish I'd never met either of you," he whined.

"Don't say that, Darling. It's bad luck."

"What do you mean bad luck? How much more bad luck could there be?"

"'Tis a bad omen," said a voice behind Ataru.

Everyone turned to look. Cherry, the two-foot tall monk with a face like a shaved monkey, stood behind Ataru, holding a staff in one hand and sipping from Lum's orange pop with the other.

"Shut up, old man," Ataru told him.

"Morobashi Ataru, you will rue the day you met the lovely Lum chan. But..."

He took a last sip and smacked his lips

"But what?" both Lum and Ataru demanded.

"Do you have any more?" asked the monk.

Lum smiled and took the bottle from his tiny hand. "I will get some, 'tcha". She floated away. Ten swam to the closet and closed the door, keeping it open just far enough to see the room.

Cherry made sure Lum could not hear, then whispered to Ataru. "Fate will give you one chance. When you see the flash you must take the tiger."

"Get away from me," Ataru told him. "You're crazy – and creepy. Just stay away from me."

Cherry cackled.

"You will rue the day!"

Lum flew back into the room and Ataru turned to look.

"There isn't any more, tcha," Lum announced. "Where did Cherry go, tcha?"

Ataru scanned the room and Ten swam back out. Cherry had vanished.

"You must have scared him off, Ataru." Ten said, and laughed at his own joke.

"That crazy old man is getting on my nerves," said Ataru. He snatched up his jacket and ran out. Lum floated after.

"Where are you going, Darling?"

Ataru charged down the stairs. "I'm going to find that old man and tell him he can't just pop up whenever he wants. I want some peace!" He raced out the entry slamming the door behind him. Lum floated followed behind.

Ataru's mother came in from the kitchen, wiping a plate on a dish towel.

"What was that about?" she asked Lum.

The girl shrugged. "Cherry told Ataru something. I guess he didn't like it, tcha."

Lum looked at the dish towel and floated next to her mother-in-law.

"Can I help, tcha?"

"I'm - I'm almost done," Ataru's mother lied and forced a smile to her face. Lum floated to the front door and went out after Ataru. Ataru's mother sighed.

"I never should have had him," she mumbled and returned to her chores.

Ataru stomped down the street, his hands in his pockets and his head down – oblivious to where he went.

"I'm not taking this any more," he grumbled. "I'm not gonna..."

Ataru bumped something and fell on his back.

"Watch where you're going!" he shouted, and then he sat up. Shinobu sat, sprawl-legged, on the sidewalk in front of him.

"Oh, sorry Shinobu." He stood up and offered her his hand to help her up. Shinobu, a lovely brown-haired girl from Ataru's class, looked at the hand, then climbed to her feet without his help.

"Look where you're walking, Ataru kun. My skirt is messed up. Now I need to change."

"Where are you going?" he asked.

"I have a date. Inaba san is taking me to dinner."

Ataru laughed. "Where? Matsuya *? Does he even eat meat?"

"We are eating at Saizeriya **, not that it's any of your business."

Ataru felt jealousy fill him. "Won't you be the cute couple; you in your dress and him in a rabbit suit."

"Hmmf! You shouldn't talk. Lum wears that swimsuit all the time - and she has GREEN HAIR!"

"I like her that way. Inaba jumps around. He eats carrots for Christ's sake."

"It's part of his job, idiot. And he gets paid to do it. Lum just sits around."

"Lum is a princess," shouted Ataru, and then he added "Of a whole PLANET," because he felt the princess part might not be sufficient.

Tears welled in Shinobu's eyes.

Ataru still felt jealous but now he felt ashamed.

"I'm sorry, Shinobu," he said. "I – I..."

"I hope," *SOB* "I h-hope you two are..." *SOB* "H-happy!"

Lum floated above the tree tops and watched as Shinobu dashed off up the sidewalk towards her home. Lum floated down and hovered just above the concrete.

"Darling, what did you say to Shinobu? Why is she crying?"

Ataru stuffed his hands back into his pockets and turned towards the vacant lot where Cherry lived.

"She's mad," he said.

"About what?"

"About Inaba."

"Did Inaba do something bad?"

"They're going out to eat, okay? Go home."

Lum smiled and clapped her hands. "Yay! They're going on a date. I'm so happy for her."

Ataru marched down the street with Lum trailing along. After a minute she spoke.

"Aren't you happy for her, Darling?"

"No," he said. "She was supposed to be... We were supposed to be together. Go home, Lum"

Lum grabbed Ataru's arm and pulled him to a stop.

"You should come home, too, Darling. Come home with me."

Ataru shrugged off Lum's grip.

"You go home. I'm talking to Cherry."

Ataru stomped away towards the lot. Lum frowned at Ataru, turned and flew off. An object fell unnoticed from her bikini top. It clanged on the sidewalk at Ataru's feet. He stopped to pick it up.

"Oh hell no," he swore. "Not this thing."

He held a metal dumb-bell, except where the weights would be, two long, narrow cones pointing to the outside. It was Lum's portable time machine. For a moment Ataru thought about tossing the device as far away as he could throw, but then another thought occurred to him. He pocketed the device and walked on to the vacant lot, smiling.

Cherry sat near a charcoal file in in improvised hibachi – a screen atop a short concrete pipe. Two fish cooked in the thin, aromatic smoke while Cherry chanted a hymn. Ataru came closer, careful not to disturb the monk's quite prayer, but close enough to listen.

Hmm-mm hmm-mm hmm-mm is through

Hmm-mm hmm-mm hmm-mm in the mire

Hmm-mm hmm-mm hmm-mm-ly lose

Hmm-mm love become a funeral pyre

Come on baby, mm-my fire

Come on baby, mm-my fire

Try to set the night on fire

"Ah!" shouted Ataru. "You crazy, worthless old fraud. That's no prayer!"

Cherry smiled. "I never said it was. Morobashi Ataru, you have come to ask my advice?"

"I've come to tell you to stay the hell away from me, old man. Get lost!"

Someone emerged from Cherry's moth-eaten tent. Ataru turned and smiled a wide, lecherous smile.

"Sakura san." He stepped to her side and hugged her tight. "It is so cold out. Let me warm you up."

The beautiful dark-haired young lady responded by kicking Ataru into a barrel pyramid at the end of the lot.

"Moroboshi, what are you saying to my uncle?"

Ataru replied, still sitting on the ground. "I was telling him how lovely you were and how much I would like to have tea with you."

Sakura glared at the boy. "Uncle?" she asked.

"He was about to ask for my advice on going back into time," said Cherry. "Very tricky."

"You need to make an offering to the spirits," said Sakura.

"A big offering," agreed Cherry. "Much food. Beef bowls."

"With pickles," added Sakura.

"What? No! You two won't get anything."

Sakura and Cherry, now dressed in ceremonial robes, stood holding bowls and waiting for the offering.

"Time travel is very tricky," said Sakura.

"Very tricky," repeated Cherry.

"You will need the advice of the spirits."

"Spirit advice."

Ataru glared the pair, then shook his head and left. Sakura went back into the tent and returned with a bowl of rice and a bowl of vegetables.

"Where are the pickles?" asked Cherry.

"There are no pickles, uncle."

"Where are the pickles? I had pickles."

Sakura hung her head. "I ate the pickles, uncle," she admitted.

Cherry shook his head. "Oh well. Morobashi will bring some."

Sakura nodded. "Let's eat."

Ataru trudged back up the sidewalk. The long day doing nothing much at all left him weary and sore. His arm still ached where Lum zapped him and Ten's fire-breath stink clung to his hair and face. The thought of the time machine in his pocket was all that propelled him: the time machine and how he could use it.

After walking through the suburbs of Tomobiki for half an hour, Ataru came to the blocks where the suburban houses became shops and apartments. One shop wase familiar mustard-colored chain restaurant named Saizeriya with its parking lot full of diners' cars. Ataru's path lead him along the restaurant's front and his curiosity made him look through the tall plate-glass windows on the dining room. Inside the dining room Ataru saw the unmistakable Inaba, complete with rabbit suit, and across from him Shinobu in a yellow dress. Unlike the Shinobu he knew – the growling, frowning, shouting shrew who hated men – the Shinobu sitting with Inaba smiled, giggled and even leaned forward on her palms. She fed him bites from her plate and even wiped a smudge of salad dressing from his chin. She was in every way devoted to a blond guy in a rabbit suit.

"Damnit, Shinobu," he said under his breath. "I wanted you."

Cold Winter wind blew down the street and Ataru pulled his jacket collar up around his neck. He jammed his hands back into his jacket and gripped the time machine hard. 'If I could just get back and change things," he thought. 'But change what?'

He passed into downtown Tomobiki with its taller offices and large stores. A few blocks in he came to a familiar intersection. A small plaque set into the sidewalk reminded him where he stood, as if Ataru Morobashi needed a reminder of his worst day.

"Here, Mankind first met the Invader Oni challenge and defeated them."

Ataru rolled his eyes.

"How come my name's not on there?" he asked. "It should be Ataru Morobashi defeated the alien Lum Invader, and Invader is her family's name."

He read the plaque again and stopped on two words – "first met". He smiled and removed the device from his pocket. "That's it," he thought. "I know what to do."

Oni symbols marked times and dates on both ends of the device. Ataru knew just enough Oni to figure out which characters meant which dates. At least he thought he knew. He twisted the ends and smacked it hard against his palm. Ataru felt himself fall backwards into nothing. A blue cloud formed around him and a thumping, oscillating noise filled his ears. He spun and twisted and, after what seemed an hour, Ataru landed on the sidewalk.

* Matsuya - A chain of beef bowl restaurants.

** Saizeriya - A chain of Italian restaurants famous for their imported Italian wines.


	2. Chapter 2

**Kagami no naka no obujekuto wa, sorera ga hyōji sa reru yori mo kimyōdearu.**

**(Objects in the Mirror are Weirder than they Appear)**

Ataru perspired in the Summer heat. People crowded along the pavement watching something happening in the road. Ataru pushed through the crowd, and the people pushed right back. He looked around, desperate to find something he could use to see the street. That is when he saw the lamp post on the corner.

Without fear of retribution from the crowd, Ataru leaped onto a man's shoulders and ran atop the people's heads until he came to the lamp post. As quick as he could, Ataru shinnied up the metal column,escaping the enraged crowd below. When no one could reach him, Ataru stuck out his tongue.

"Nyaaa!"

Ataru turned his attention to the street and witnessed a strange thing. A boy a little younger than himself stood stock still on the street as if waiting for something. Lum stood a ways off staring at the boy. He was too late, the game was in progress. Around the pair, the crowd remained silent. Ataru shinnied a little further up the pole and then he spied something up near the top – something that did not belong. Up he climbed, and up and up until his arms ached. The crowd ignored him and he climbed higher until he recognized the object.

"Oh my God! This is not happening!"

He removed the object – a sort of spear gun and fishing rod stuck together. Tape dangled from where it was attached to the pole.

"There – there is no way this can possibly..."

And then he remembered. Below, the boy raised his hand in the air. He shouted "For my marriage!" and Ataru knew. He dropped the object. Down and down it fell as he held his breath, half hoping that the boy – that he – would miss it.

The object fell into the boy's hand and Ataru closed his eyes. In his memory he felt the gun go off, felt the shock in the line as it collided with Lum's chest, felt the muscles in his arms tighten as he pulled back on the line.

"The line," he thought. "That line. It was a cable, not a fishing line. But Lum saw it. She could have zapped me."

He opened his eyes and down below a topless Lum lunged for her clothing while covering her breasts.

And her eyes were not looking at the boy. Lum looked up at him.

"Aiieee!" he shrieked and lost his grip on the post. A hand reached down and snagged him by his flying arm.

"Shut up, Morobashi!" a female voice commanded.

Shinobu stood above him on the post, dressed in her school outfit. Ataru tilted his head back and stared up her dark blue skirt.

"Stop looking up my...! You pervert! Your f-fiancee is down there topless and you're looking up my...?"

Sinobu lifted Ataru by one hand. He hung limp and ashamed before her – and then he looked down her shirt.

*SLAP!*

"Aiieee! That hurts!"

Shinobu set Ataru down on the lamppost where he clung like a sloth to a branch-top.

"This is important, Ataru kun, so listen."

"All right. All right, I'll listen."

"You went back in time," Shinobu told him, "And you fixed a little problem, but now there are more problems. If you don't fix them all then this won't happen."

"That's what I want!" Ataru told her. "That's why I came back here. I wanted us to be together."

"Baka! That can't happen. Inaba fixed the doors. I don't want that anymore, so you need to fix this whole mess."

"But... But you promised to marry me."

Shinobu scowled at him. "You promised to marry Lum. Now fix this or … or I will never forgive you."

Shinobu removed something from a pocket. It was long like a pointed dumb bell. She twisted both ends.

"That's Lum's time travel thing," said Ataru.

"Yes. How do you think I got back here."

"How did you get it?"

Shinobu struck the device.

"You gave it to me." she said and fell backwards through the door.

The crowd stood in the street, jostling and pushing each other for a chance to see the boy. Lum, forgotten for the moment, flew above the crowd, landing on the sidewalk behind. Ataru slid down the post to meet her. People followed the girl overhead, and the ones at the furthest back, where she landed, stopped pushing and watched Lum and Ataru together.

"Do you see that?" they murmured, "It's that Morobashe boy."

"How can he be over there? He's still in the street?"

Ataru stared at the curious people. He leaned over to Lum.

"Lum, get us out of here."

"Okay, tcha."

Lum picked Ataru up under his arms and carried the boy to the roof of the closest building. People tracked the pair across the sky but lost interest when they disappeared.

"Darling, you embarrassed me back there, tcha," she set Ataru down on the gravel roof. "If you didn't tell me it was the only way for us to be married, I would never let you do that in front of all those people, tcha!"

Ataru stood and gaped at Lum but did not move.

"Oh no!," she said. "Did I forget how to speak Japanese?"

"I never told you that," said Ataru. His face was turning red, "Why would I tell you something like that."

"Oops! I thought you told yourself already, tcha. I'm sorry."

"Wait. I told you about this? in the future?"

Lum nodded. She forced a smile to her face.

"And you... You what? came back here?"

Lum nodded again.

"You mean," said Ataru, his anger rising, "that none of this would have happened – EVER – f I hadn't... If you hadn't...ARRRRGGHHH!"

"Darling, calm down. We planned all this together, tcha?"

"NO WE DID NOT!" screamed the boy.

"'Tis fate."

Ataru, panting now in his deep anger, spun around to face Cherry.

"THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT!" he yelled. "WHY DIDN"T YOU TELL ME THIS WOULD HAPPEN?!"

Cherry shrugged. "'Tis fate," he repeated. "I told you time travel is tricky."

There are hues of red, described by art and chemistry, deeper than vermillion, darker than red sable, port and pine pitch. Normal living human flesh cannot attain those colors. Both Cherry and Lum watched in horror as Ataru's face deepened to an indescribable color; the darkest red imaginable.

"Lum, he will explode," Cherry told the girl."

"I - I think so. Can you help him?"

Cherry shook his head. "He is possessed by an evil spirit. I will drive it out. Do you have any taiyaki?"

"There is a stand just up the street. I'll get some, tcha."

Lum flew away. When she left Cherry walked to the shaking, burning Ataru and hit him on the head with his prayer stick.

"Morobashi Ataru, you have started a cycle you must not break."

"To hell with you, old man." Ataru rubbed his head. "Get away from me." he stormed away.

"If you do not fulfill your destiny Lum will never have come here," shouted Cherry.

"So what?" asked Ataru. "I'll have peace."

"And what of Shinobu chan? She will not meet Inaba."

"She and I will be together."

"But Inaba has remade the doors. Your door leads to Lum and hers to Inaba."

Ataru stopped. "We can't be together?"

Cherry shook his head.

"Not ever?"

"Shinobu will be alone and you will be an old man chasing women."

"My harem?"

"Hmmph! Harem. You cannot even get a girl to go to tea..." Cherry thought for a moment. "Unless she is cursed. Or dead. Or doesn't have another choice in the world."

"Are you finished?" asked Ataru.

Cherry rubbed his chin in thought. "Hmmm, yes."

Lum returned with a taiyaki biscuits bag.

"Here," she said and handed the bag to Cherry, then looked at Ataru.

"Darling! You look pale. What did Cherry do?"

Cherry cackled as he walked to the roof stairs leaving Lum to care for the slumped Ataru. Before he turned started down he stopped and turned around.

"Or a green-haired tiger-alien from another planet. He he he he." *MUNCH*

Later that evening, Lum and Ataru sat in the Invader's ship eating with her parents. Ataru sat next to Lum, staring at a glass of water.

"Have something to eat, Darling," insisted Lum.

Ataru shook his head. His eye remained fixed on the glass.

"If you don't like my daughter's cooking why did you ask her to marry you?" asked Mr. Invader.

"I don't know," answered Ataru. His voice was weak.

"Son-in-law, let me tell you something about my daughter. She is a great pi..."

"Father!" shouted Lum. "You promised. Darling made you, tcha. Ooops!"

"This is terrible!" shouted Mr. Invader. "I bring my only daughter across the galaxy and back in time because my son-in-law can't figure out how to get himself out of a jam without her - and he doesn't know why."

"What do you mean I made him promise?" asked Ataru. "What did I make him promise?"

"Darling eat some food." Lum took a fork-full of a dish and jabbed it into Ataru's open mouth.

At once Ataru screamed in pain, then danced around shouting "Hot! Hot! Hot!" before he passed out. As he lay unconscious on the floor his lips began to swell like bicycle inner tubes.

Mr. Invader looked at his son-in-law and shook his head.

"Doesn't like your cooking, doesn't want to share a futon with you, and doesn't know why he wants you here. What do you see in him?"

Lum smiled at her father. "I love him."

She scooped Ataru up in her arms and flew him off to her spaceship. Once inside she laid him down on a couch and went to the controls. She set the ship to land back in Tomobiki and sat beside Ataru.

"Darling, you idiot. Why did you make me promise not to tell you anything, tcha? I know you love me but seeing you like this is too much. Please hurry up so we can be together, tcha."


	3. Chapter 3

**Sore ga kōseina gēmudesu**

**(It Is Fair Game)**

The next morning Ataru awoke on his own futon. Except for the slight swelling and tenderness around his lips, he could almost believe he dreamed it all up. He rolled over. The time device fell from his jacket and onto the floor with a clang. Ataru reached down and picked it up, then stuffed it back into his pocket. When he did he found a note inside. He read it.

'Darling, hurry up and use the time device This won't work if you wait.

P.S. Go outside when you use it.'

He found a pair of hundred-yen notes as well.

"And if I just sit here and stare at the mark in the ceiling?" he asked himself.

Ataru laid back on his pillow. He found the stain and concentrated, then smiled.

"Aha. My own beauty, and no one can take her away. Hee hee hee hee."

As he stared at the woman he noticed a strange transformation. Her hair grew long and flowing, her ears grew points, her eyes enlarged, and if Ataru concentrated hard enough, he could just make out the tiny horns on the woman's head. The stain was now Lum, and Ataru knew he could not transform her back.

"Aw Lum, you dummy. What did you get me into this time?"

He reached into his pocket and drew out the time device. When he examined the dials he noticed those were set for two days before the game's end. Ataru rolled off the futon and prepared to set the device, then stopped.

"Should I go get Shinobu? What about Cherry, and Lum. Should tell them?"

He took out Lum's note and reread it. 'This won't work if you wait.'

"Okay Lum, but you'd better be telling the truth." Ataru ran outside the back door, grabbing his shoes on the way. He hit the device just as he left the back door and fell through space and time.

He landed with a thud on the green grass in his own back yard. Above him hovered a familiar flying motorcycle with two young women riding; Benten drove and wore a red and black leather bikini with a chain around her body, Oyuki rode behind and dressed in regal robes, sitting very proper.

"Morobashi, you dim wit. Get on," said Benten. "You didn't give yourself enough time."

Oyuki reached down to help Ataru on board while Benten revved the engine. Ataru wrapped his arms around Oyuki's chest so he could touch her breasts when a precise elbow strike knocked him on his temple. Oyuki loosened Ataru's grip and removed his arms.

"I'll fall off!" protested Ataru. "I need to hold on to you."

"Hold on to the bike, Morobashi," said Benten. "You'll live longer."

Ataru held onto the seat. "Where are we going?".

"You don't know?" asked Benten.

"He doesn't know," said Oyuki.

"Damnit, Morobashi, you need to tell yourself what's going on."

"Actually, Benten, wouldn't Morobashi need to tell himself first before he could tell Morobashi."

"Show off!" shouted Benten and the bike zoomed up into the sky.

"What is she talking about?" Ataru shouted. The engine's roar deafened him.

"Neptunians don't have problems with time travel, so she can keep all the different versions of you straight."

"All the... different... How many 'Me's are there?"

"Just the three," answered Oyuki.

"That we know of," interjected Benten. "Morobashi-3 is a tight-lipped bastard."

"Benten!" warned Oyuki. "That's enough."

"Which one am I?" asked Ataru.

"Morobashi-1."

"Morobashi," corrected Oyuki.

"See? Show off."

"Shut up!" Screamed Ataru. "Where are we going?"

"The fair," answered Oyuki.

"What's down there?"

"He doesn't know?" Asked Benten.

"He doesn't know," answered Oyuki.

"This should be fun."

Ataru moaned. "I wish I'd stayed in bed.

Benten set the bike down next to a Ferris wheel decorated with racoons and hippos. She delighted in scattering the fair goers as she landed. Ataru shuddered when he saw the fair.

"This place creeps me out," he said.

Benten shrugged. "It's a fair not a curse. Get over it."

Ataru climbed off and the bike lifted back into the air.

"Good luck, Morobashi san," called Oyuki.

"Yeah,' said Benten. "I'd hate to see what you have in store for yourself if she winds up with a broken heart."

The pair flew off.

Ataru turned around to get his bearings, surveying for landmarks as well as pretty girls. An attractive woman leaned against a fence near the Ferris wheel. Ataru walked to her.

"Miss, can I have your phone number and address?" he begged.

The woman slapped his cheek hard, then turned and left.

"Christ, that stung."

He remembered Cherry's words at the game and thought about his track record. He listed all the girls he dated, trying to discover one the monk had overlooked.

"Ghost girl. Girl cursed by a water spirit. Bat pretending to be a girl. Shinobu. Lum."

And of those girls Lum remained with him.

He walked on through the park, lost in thought.

"What am I supposed to do?" he thought. "Why can't I have Shinobu? Why do I keep thinking about Lum?"

He walked past game booths: ring toss, basketball throw, water shooting. A dark haired girl stood near the water game looking in at the prizes. She looked a few years younger than himself, but Ataru stopped to looked at her figure, then calculate her age.

"Hey, how old are you?" he asked.

"Fourteen," said the girl.

"Bah! Too young." he jammed his hands into his pants pockets and walked on.

"Oh, boy! Boy!" called the girl. "Will you win me that bear?"

"Go away you little brat," he told her.

"Please? It's the bear I always wanted."

The girl began to cry and Ataru clenched his fists. He turned around, crimson faced again, and stomped back to the stall.

"All right. Shut up! I'll win the bear."

"Oh, thank you, boy," said the young girl.

Ataru stepped to the booth. "How much?"

The booth man looked down at him from his stool. His long, scraggly blond hair hung down in greasy strands from inside a battered straw hat. "Hundred yen," he lisped.

Ataru patted his pockets, then grinned at the girl. "No money," he said. "Can you pay?"

"Oh! No. I can't pay. Ah-hoo-oo-oo," she cried. "Please, please win that bear for me."

Ataru looked up at the boothman who shook his head. "She's a little young for you, ain't she?" he asked.

"Shut your mouth, carnie."

He stuck his hand back into his pants pocket and felt the note along with the hundred-yen bills. He pulled one out and slapped it on the counter.

"Let's play," he said.

The booth man chuckled. He pointed at the three plastic frogs on the counter.

"You gotta play against someone. It's a race."

The girl looked at him, tears in her eyes and her lower lip quivering.

"I'll play," she volunteered.

Ataru sighed and slapped the other bill on the counter. The booth man gathered up the cash and sat back down on his stool.

"Point the frog at the target. The winner gets a prize."

Ataru did his best to aim his frog at the hole in the target center. Next to him the girl did the same.

"Ready. Go," said the man.

Water streamed from both frogs' mouths. Ataru kept his stream steady. Above the target a tiny tiger rose along a tree. A monkey rose along the girl's tree, except this one rose much faster than Ataru's.

Water stream into the targets, with neither opponent looking away for a second. After a full minute the monkey reached the tree top and a loud buzzer sounded.

"We have a winner," announced the booth man. "What prize would you like?"

"The bear, please," answered the girl.

The booth man took down a blue stuffed bear from a rack above the trees and handed it to the girl who walked away.

"Hey!" shouted Ataru. "Aren't you going to thank me?"

The girl turned around and stuck out her tongue, then blew a long raspberry back at Ataru.

"Sucker!" she shouted and ran away.

"You bitch! Liar! I hope that bear catches on fire!"

The booth man laughed.

"What's so funny, damnit?" demanded Ataru. "That girl just took a two hundred yen bear from me."

"Boy, that bear isn't even worth fifty yen," the man told him, "and you gave it to her. I got your money. All you got is your ugly face."

Ataru swung his fist at the man but he deflected it. He swung around and hit Ataru in his stomach, folding him up.

"Ohh! Good hit," groaned Ataru.

"Go away, monkey, or I'll beat your ass."

Ataru grumbled and walked away. Three booths down, he saw the girl sneak back, still holding the bear. She handed the prize to the man who put it back on the shelf, then took her position beside the booth.

"Hey!" Shouted Ataru. "Thief! Cheat! You stole my money! You stole my money!"

"Wah!" cried the girl. "I didn't like the bear. I gave it back."

"Shut up, you little bitch," Ataru told her. "You cheated me once but not this time."

"You ugly monkey," said the girl. She stopped crying. "You're so stupid you should have just gave me the money."

"You little bitch!"

"Fine," said the booth man. He took two hundred-yen bills from his box. "Here. take it a get out. You're scaring customers."

"No!" said Ataru.

"Take your money, monkey," said the girl.

"No!" he repeated.

"What do you want then?" asked the man.

"The bear."

"Take the money," said the man.

"The bear. I want the bear."

"Baka! Moron!" said the girl. "Take the money."

"Bear! Bear! Bear!"

The man growled at Ataru, then handed him the little blue bear. "Take it."

"No!" said Ataru. "I want the big one."

At the shelf end sat a bear almost as large as Ataru.

"No!" said the man.

"I want that bear! Give it to me or I'll tell everyone that this little girl is a lying bitch and you are using her to cheat."

"No!" said the man.

Ataru ran up and down the booths shouting to everyone nearby. "Liar! Liar! Cheat! He took my money! He took my money!"

"All right!" shouted the booth man as sweet as he could. "Here's your bear, little boy."

Ataru raced back to the booth and took the bear from the man's outstretched hands.

"Now get lost," the girl told him.

"And don't ever come back here, stupid ugly monkey," added the man.

Ataru stuck his tongue out at the pair. "Hee hee hee," he laughed and jogged away.

Ataru left the games to find a place to sit.

"Now I have a babe magnet," he thought. "I can get some phone numbers.."

He walked near a fountain where two boys played with some cheap fair prizes in the water. One held a fishing pole and the other a short dart gun.

"Bear!" said one boy when he saw Ataru's giant bear.

"Bear!" said the other one.

Ataru could see now that the boys were brothers. The pair hugged and climbed on the bear.

"Hey! Get away from that!" Ataru picked the bear up and held it above his head.

"Wah! Bear! Bear! Bear!" the brother's shouted.

A woman in a short, low-cut dress sitting on a bench nearby came to their side.

"Boys! What's wrong?" she asked.

"Wah! Bear! Bear!" the both answered.

Ataru looked at the pretty woman and smiled.

"Do you two want this bear?" she asked the boys.

"Yes!" they both shouted. "Bear! Bear! Bear!"

"Get lost," Ataru whispered to the boys. He kept smiling at the woman.

"Would you please give my boys that bear?" asked the woman. She batted her eyelashes at Ataru and wiggled her hips just enough for Ataru to notice.

Ataru stood up, still holding the bear out of reach.

"Could I have your address and phone number?"

*SLAP!*

Ataru fell backwards into the fountain, letting the bear go as he dropped.

"Bear! Bear! Bear!" shouted the boys and snatched the bear away before it fell into the water.

"Come on dears," said the woman and she dragged them away from the fountain.

"Fish! Fish!" shouted one boy. "Dart! Dart!" shouted the other. "Wah!" they both cried.

Their mother dragged the boys away, leaving their toys behind.

Ataru sat in the basin with the luke-warm water raining on his head. He shook the fishing pole and the dart gun at the crying boys.

"Ahah!" he shouted. "I've got your toys! You little brats. Come back here!"

"Waaaaah!" cried the boys as their mother pulled them away.

Ataru stood up, still shaking the toys.

"Rotten stinking little brats! I'll make them..."

For the first time he looked at the toys in his hands.

"Oh no! Oh hell no!"

He sat down on the fountain edge, still dripping. It looked to Ataru that the toys, when taken apart, would go back together as the bikini-remover. He did not know how to do that, but he thought he could find out, or rather he knew a person who might know. For a minute he attempted to produce a better plan. At last he stood and with fierce look raised the dart gun in the air.

"Mendo! It has come to this," he shouted.

A park security guard glared down at the teenager.

"Oi! Kid! No swimming in the fountains."

"Sorry," said Ataru skulked away.


	4. Chapter 4

**Gūzen no sōsaku to taibō no ryōtan**

**(Accidental Creations and Long Awaited Ends)**

A small and crooked-back woman in a shawl stood before the Shautaro estate front gates. She carried a covered basket on her arm and wore a sugegasa on her head. A tall guard in a black suit and sunglasses stared past her.

"Please kind sir," said the woman, "Please let me speak with the young master of the house. I know he will want to..."

"No!" answered the guard. "Go away you hag."

"Hag! Hag!" shouted the woman. "That's the way you treat an old woman around here?"

"Shove off old woman," said the guard.

"I am an old woman. I am selling Ikarisou . Let me in you giant prick!"

"No. Get lost."

The old woman growled at the guard, then threw off her sugegasa and stared the guard right in his sunglasses. The woman was Ataru.

"I am from the Tomobiki high school," lied Ataru. "I have been sent here to test the young master Mendo before he starts class. You will let me in!"

"No," said the guard.

"No? No? Tomobiki high school demands you let me in.

"The young master will not see you," insisted the guard.

"Why?"

"The young master is not here."

Ataru stared at the the guard. The guard stared back. Somewhere a cicada buzzed. Ataru blinked. The guard stared back.

"Oh," Ataru said. "In that case can you help me with..."

"Beat it, monkey boy."

Six more guards arrived. Two grabbed Ataru by his armpits and lifted him off the ground.

"Put me down! Put me down! You bastards! You can't do this!"

The men carried Ataru a little ways away from the gate. Two more guards grabbed his legs and the final two took positions at either side, hanging on to his belt. As one they swung Ataru back and then forward.

"One!" The guards shouted.

Then they repeated the movement.

"Two!"

"Hey! Hey! Hey! You can't just..."

Ataru swung backwards and then forwards. On the third swing the guards let go, sending him flying off down a steep hill where he tumbled head over heels until he reached the bottom.

"AiiieeeAiiieeeAiiieeeAiiieee AiiieeeAiiieeeAiiieeeAiiieee AiiieeeAiiieeeAiiieeeAiiieee AiiieeeAiiiee!"

Ataru lay in the weeds for a minute listening to the summer birds. His basket landed on his head with a thunk.

"To hell with it," he said. "I'll just have to lose the game."

A pop sounded behind him as if a lightbulb broke on a sidewalk. Shinobu stood facing away from him. She wore a pale yellow dress with long, lace ribbons at the waist and a matching yellow bow in her dark brown hair.

"Where the hell are you?" she shouted.

"Back here," answered Ataru.

Shinobu turned and glared at him.

"I'm getting tired of coming back here and kicking your lazy, stupid ass into gear. I have nice clothes on so I won't beat you up, but if you screw this up I will beat you to a bloody pulp and kick what's left of you in to space. Do you hear me Ataru kun?"

Ataru stared at Shinobu, a big, lecherous smile on his face.

"What are you grinning at you idiot?"

Then Shinobu realized she stood between the sun and Ataru and that he could, she thought, see right through her dress. She looked down and then up at Ataru. Ataru shrank back from Shinobu's glare.

"Hee hee hee?"

"Letch! Pervert! You'll ruin everything!" She stepped forward and raised her hand in the air as if to strike his face but when he slunk down to the ground and hugged her ankle she froze.

"Christ! How could someone like you turn into someone like... you're going to be? Arrggghh!"

"You have very nice legs, Shinobu."

She kicked Ataru across the hillside where he sprawled in a clump of daisies.

"You listen up, monkey brains. You sent me back here again, to tell you that if you don't get off your lazy ass and make this plan work I will haunt you for the rest of your days - AND THEN SOME!"

Shinobu removed the time device from her dress and hit one end. The door in space opened and she fell through, flipping him the finger as she did.

Ataru sat alone once more.

"Shinobu," he thought. "Hell, am I doing it all for her? That..." but he could not quit finish the sentence.

"Lum!" he screamed. "Where are you?"

Ataru wandered Tomobiki's city center, skirting the busy streets. As he walked he tried to figure out a how to assemble the device and to put his feelings for Shinobu and Lum together.

"This makes no sense," he said to himself. "I love Lum, but she's a pain in my ass and I don't want to get married yet. I love Shinobu and I want her back, but Shinobu is, is – she's Inaba's." Ataru's heart ached when he said those words..

"Why am I doing this for Shinobu if I don't get her? If I have to be stuck with Lum, then why am I doing it at all?"

"Crazy boy," said one woman.

Ataru stopped and looked around. He had wandered into a crowded street. Everyone around him stared. One mother picked up her crying child and comforted him.

"That's all right," she said. "The crazy boy will go away now." and glared at Ataru.

Ataru slinked into an alley.

'Where can I go to get this fixed?' he thought. 'I wonder where everyone is right now?'

And, for no reason at all Ataru thought of Megane, the glasses-wearing, self-appointed leader of Lum's Stormtroopers.

A half hour later Ataru stood on a suburban lawn on Tomobiki's outskirts.

"Megane!" he shouted. "Megane! Come out here."

On the second floor a glass door slid open on a narrow balcony. A tall boy wearing glasses stepped out.

"Who the hell...? Morobashi? What the hell do you want? Are you drunk?"

"Megane. thank God you're up. I need your help right now."

"Go back home you fucking moron. It's eleven o'clock. You have that tag game tomorrow."

"No! I don't have time to explain. Shinobu will kill me if I don't get this thing done."

"Shinobu?" Megane asked. "Isn't she your girlfriend or something?"

"Yes! Yes. She is. She's my girlfriend." True enough for that particular moment in time, and for a particular definition of "my".

"She wants me to make a... thing, for getting clothes... from a … clothes line. Yes, that's it."

Ataru felt pleased with himself for making up that lie. It was almost the truth..

"Make it yourself, moron. I'm going to sleep." The boy turned around and went back into his room.

"Megane! I can't do this. Magane! Help me or I will... haunt your the rest of your days – and then some."

"Eh?" Megane returned to the balcony and looked down at Ataru. "How will you do that?"

Ataru threw up his hands in frustration. "Look, just put something together for me and that will be that."

Magane stared down at Ataru. "Screw off, dick head." and he returned to his room.

Ataru watched the lights go off in Magane's room, then he went under the balcony. With effort, Ataru pushed a potted plant under the railing, then stepped on the pot rim and, balancing on one foot, grabbed the balcony edge. Ataru held the basket in his teeth, then used both hands to pull himself up to the edge and then over the railing. He stood, triumphant on the balcony deck and beat against the glass doors.

"Megane! Megane! Open up, Megane!"

Once again the light snapped on and once again the boy opened the door.

"Get off my damned balcony, dick head, or I'll lift you up and drop you over the edge."

"Like you could," said Ataru.

Megane picked the boy up by his arm pit, lifting him him above his head.

"I was just kidding! Megane! You can't throw me! I might lose the game!"

Megane put Ataru down. "True. I cannot harm you – for the sake of the Earth."

Ataru uncovered the basket and showed the boy the devices.

"I need these put together so the spring launches the line with, say, a suction cup, on the end, and I can pull it back with the fishing line."

"He he he," Megane laughed. "Morobashi, this would be good at ripping clothes off girls."

Ataru smiled his best innocent smile. "He he he. Would it? That I didn't think of that."

"Don't lie to me, Morobashi. This is a device to rip girls clothes off. You are a pervert."

"No! It's not like that! You must help me!"

Megane looked shocked. "Who said I wasn't going to help you?" He took the parts to a table in his room and began taking them to pieces.

"Just what made you think of me for this?"

"I know you're building a gundam suit."

"Who told you that?" Now Megane grinned wide and innocent.

"Er, Perm did, or Chibi. One of them."

Megane turned back to the work. "I'll never speak to those two again," he growled under his breath.

Ataru heard this and thought 'At least one good thing might come out of all of this. Lum's Stormtroopers might not exist.' Ataru looked around the boy's room. On every wall were posters and pictures of a dark-haired girl in a bikini.

"Who's the babe?" he asked.

"Agnes Lum," answered Megane. "Very beautiful. She's my ideal woman."

"Lum?" asked Ataru. "The Oni girl's name is Lum."

"Is it?" asked Magane. "I didn't know. Maybe I should watch you play tomorrow."

Ataru swallowed, knowing what he had just done.

"Heh heh. I don't think you'd like her very much," he told Megane, but he knew it wold do no good. As he looked up Ataru could see a poster of Agnes Lum in a tiger-striped bikini, as large as life, taped to the ceiling over Megane's bed. He looked at the poster, then at the bed, then over at Megane. He stepped away.

It took Magane fifteen minutes to attach the devices. He handed it to Ataru.

Ataru's eye buldged with frustrated anger. "This isn't done!" he shouted. "Where's the suction cup!? Where's the string!? This won't work!"

Magane adjusted his glasses.

"Look, moron, you didn't bring me a suction cup, and anyway you should coat it with glue or something sticky. The string won't be strong enough. You'll need to use wire or cable. That will work."

"It better," Ataru warned. He walked to the sliding door and stepped out on the balcony to leave.

"Just do me one favor," asked megane.

"Sure, "growled Ataru. "What?"

"Just tell me when you use it. I want to see it first hand."

Ataru looked back into the room at the poster on the ceiling.

"Don't worry, Magane. Something tells me you'll be right there when it happens."

Ataru climbed back down to the potted plant and then jumped to the grass. Megane watched him go.

"Pervert," he said and went back to bed.

Ataru walked back to the city. He ached and his muscles felt heavy. He wanted to go back to his own futon and sleep – and talk to Lum.

"This always happens," he told himself. "I always miss Lum when I don't see her for a while, and then I see her and she reminds me why I don't like seeing her."

Ataru removed the time travel device from his pocket and set it for the present day, ten months in the future.

"Why can't I date girls?" he said. "Why do I have to spend my youth tied to Lum. I'm too young to be married."

Ataru slipped into an alley and hit the device, then felt the familiar falling sensation as he traveled through time.

He landed in the alley in a snow -covered garbage pile. The familiar words "Darling! Darling!" echoing overhead..

"I'm here, Lum. Over here!"

Lum hovered a few feet above him holding his coat.

"You asked me to be here when you got back. Did you make the reel-gun?"

Ataru held up the device for Lum.

"Very crude, but it works, tcha. All you need now is the cable and cup. I should tell you it fit right over my breast, tcha."

She flipped down her bikini, exposing her right breast to Ataru. The boy's eyes fixed on the beautiful object.

"Measure it so you know how big the cup should be, tcha."

"You want me to - to t-touch you... You want me to touch your tit?"

Lum grabbed Ataru's hand and placed it on her breast. "I am your wife, tcha."

"Ahhhhhh," moaned the boy.

Lum giggled. "That tickles. Just measure me, tcha."

Ataru took his hand and laid it flat against Lum's breast, forcing his brain to remember the size.

"You know, you could have touched me there any time you wanted, tcha."

Ataru looked up into Lum's eyes, then back down to her breasts. His other hand reached up to to work his fingers under her left bikini.

"Oh, Darling. This isn't the place, tcha. Please s-stop."

Once again, Ataru looked up at Lum's eyes. She returned his gaze. Ataru removed his hands and replaced the stretchy, silky fabric around Lum's breasts.

"Maybe... someday, tcha" Lum told him. She opened her eyes and looked down at him. She blushed.

"You need to finish this tonight., tcha. You need to get it onto the pole and out of there in time."

"Lum, you dummy, I have the time thingy. I can go back to any time I want."

"Darling, you don't understand, tcha. You can't go back to a time you've already been to, tcha."

"Hee hee hee, or what? The universe will explode?"

"Oh no, Darling. You'll be pulled back to wherever you started, tcha."

Ataru thought about this. "You mean I'll just be zapped back to the future?"

"Yes, plus any time that past when you back there, tcha."

"You mean when I go back in time, time passes here, too?"

"Hmm-mm. And when you're here, time passes back there, tcha. You're running out of time, tcha."

Ataru yawned. "I need some sleep. It's been a long day."

"I will fly you home, but you can only take a short nap, tcha. This needs to be finished or..."

"Or what?" asked Ataru. "I won't win the contest? You already said I asked you to play it! It's not real. Why won't anyone tell me what's going on?"

Lum picked up Ataru under his arms and flew away towards his house.

"Oni tag is sacred, tcha. When you challenged me to play I had to play to win. Cheating would be a great sin, tcha."

Ataru swallowed. "You mean the game is- is really for REAL!"

"Yes, Darling. My father will bring in his space army and take over the planet if you lose. You agreed, tcha."

"But, but, but WHY?! Why would I do that?"

Lum smiled down at Ataru. "Because of love, tcha."

"Love," grumbled Ataru. "I just want babes."

The pair flew to Ataru's house where they entered through the balcony door. Ataru slept already so Lum laid him down on his futon and sat near him while he snored. Ten floated over and hovered near Lum's shoulder.

"Lum, are you going to tell him what's happening?" he asked.

"No, I can't, tcha. I promised Ataru I wouldn't, tcha."

"Do you think he'll be mad?"

"When?"

"When he finds out you've been lying to him?"

Lum thought about this, then looked down at Ataru.

"It won't matter. He'll love me, tcha."

Ten smiled a wide, evil smile.

"I want to watch when you tell him. Oh! I remember something. That little priest monkey guy. He told Ataru something about fate and a tiger."

"I know, tcha. Darling told me, tcha."

"Oh." Ten thought about the saying. "Are you – are you the tiger?"

Lum nodded. "Ten, you need to go home soon, tcha. You know that. We all need to go, tcha. I want you to pack your bike and things up tomorrow, tcha."

"I - I don't want to go."

Lum smiled at her cousin. "But I do. Darling is waiting for me, tcha."


	5. Chapter 5

**Fuun'na sentaku o sakeru koto ga dekinai**

**(A Fated Choice Cannot Be Avoided)**

"Darling, wake up. It's midnight, tcha. You've got to wake up, tcha."

"Mmmm. That feels good," answered Ataru.

Lum could see he still slept.

She blew into Ataru's ear. "Ataru. It's time to wake up, tcha."

"Mmm. Please do that some more."

"You like it when I do that, yes?"

"Oh yes," answered the boy. "Please do that some more, Shinobu."

Lum's eyes flashed to angry circles and electricity crackled from her hands.

"Darling! You idiot!"

Lum jolted Ataru awake as she applied her divine retribution.

"Get up! Get up! You lazy boy, tcha. Get up and finish that thing so I can go back, tcha."

Ataru lay on his futon, a smoking pile of singed hair and blackened clothes.

"Uhhhn," he moaned. "Lum, you retard. Why did you do that?"

"Get up, tcha! Shinobu has Inaba now and you need to finish your job, tcha."

Ataru sat up and smoothed down his sparking hair.

"Wait," he said. "Did you just say you were going back? Where?"

Lum glared at him, her lips sealed tight.

"If that's the way you're going to be I don't know why I should bother."

"Ohhh, you idiot! If you don't finish this thing then I will never forgive you, tcha!"

"That's what Shinobu said."

"That's because I told her to say that, tcha."

Ataru confused now. "Wait, is it you or Shinobu who won't forgive me?"

"GET UP, TCHA!"

"Fine, fine." Ataru stood up. He removed the time device from his pants pocket and hit one end. "But I don't know why I should have to suffer like this. All I'd have to do is go forward in time and tell you not to come back here."

The door opened and Ataru fell through.

"Don't even think that, tcha!" shouted Lum, and Ataru fell back in time.

He knew the date – the last day of the game. By now everyone in the world knew Ataru's face. For ten days he looked like a fool on television as the planet watched. Ataru walked through the deserted outer streets of downtown Tomobiki searching for parts for the reel-gun, thankful no one saw him.

"Damn it, I could have picked up the parts easy in the future. Why does this have to be so hard?"

He passed a store with displays of nails and tape in the window, then backed up to read the sign.

"Why didn't I think of this before?"

The store sold hardware. Ataru walked inside and greeted the man behind the counter.

"Hello. I am Morobashi Ataru."

The man watched the game on a tiny television at the counter's end. He looked at the television, then back to Ataru, then back to the television.

"What is this?" asked the man. "You're supposed to be playing the game."

"It's finished for the day. Can you help me?"

"Finished? FINISHED? You're still running! That alien girl is still flying away! GO PLAY THE GAME!"

"Ahh," Ataru stalled, trying to think. "It's - it's on tape delay. It's done for today. Do you have any cable?"

"Tape delay? What's that?"

"That's when they tape something and play it back later. I'm done for the day. Where are your suction cups?"

"But the television says this is live!"

"Yes, it does. do you have anything I can put on the end of the cable to..."

"But you are supposed to be playing! GO PLAY!"

Ataru sighed.

"Look, old man. I'm here, right?"

The man looked at Ataru as if he didn't quite believe his eyes.

"Yes," he answered.

"So how can I be on the TV, too?"

The man looked from the television to Ataru, then back to the television, then back to Ataru. He scratched his bald head.

"I don't know."

"I can't," Ataru told him. "There's no way. Now can you help me?"

The man looked at the television one last time, then came around the counter and lead Ataru through the store gathering up the items he needed to complete the reel-gun. When he finished the man placed the items on the counter and came around the back. With the greatest care he totaled up the items on the register and placed each on in a paper sack.

"That will be twenty-thousand-two-hundred yen."

"What?!" asked Ataru in shock. "But I'm Morobashi Ataru!"

"Yes," answered the man, "and this will be twenty-thousand-two-hundred yen."

"But, but, but I'm a famous person! I'm on TV. You said it yourself!"

The man nodded. "Yes, you are famous, I will give you that."

"And I'm on TV," insisted Ataru.

The man nodded again. "That is true. That is true."

"Then I need these things." Ataru held out his hand to receive the bag.

The man looked at Ataru's hand and then back at the bag.

"You are playing tag with an alien and you have yet to win. This could go either way. Tomorrow, when the time runs out, I could find myself out on the street with an Oni running the shop. That will be twenty-thousand-two-hundred yen, please."

"But I need these things to win. You must give them to me."

"I must, must I?" The man leaned over the counter and smiled a wide, toothy smile at Ataru. "And just what will you do if I don't?"

Ataru stared at the man. The man stared back. Their eyes narrowed.

"AAIIIEEE! AN ALIEN!" shouted Ataru and pointed behind him.

The man turn around. Ataru grabbed the sack off the counter and dashed to the door.

"Stop! Thief!" shouted the man and raced after the fleeing Ataru, but by the time he reached the door Ataru vanished.

"I know who you are!" the shopkeeper shouted down the street. "You'll never get any respect in this town again, even if you do win!"

Ataru raced down an alley, holding the bag in his hand.

"Hee hee hee. I beat you you fat bastard."

He sat down and began attaching the cable to the reel and the suction cup to line. He reeled it in and remembered he still needed glue and tape.

"Damn it! Still not done."

He heard a pop and a crash as if someone stepped on a light bulb and fell over a garbage can. Ataru closed his eyes and nodded his head, accepting his fate.

"I'm working on it, Shinobu." he said. "Go home!"

"Ah. Um," mumbled a man's voice. "Shinobu got tired of coming back here. She sent me instead."

Ataru turned around. Inaba, in his white rabbit suit, sat surrounded by dirty paper bags a little ways up the alley.

"She said I should tell you that if you don't hurry up then Lum will win the game and the world will end." Inaba looked confused. "Is that true?"

Ataru sighed. "Sure. Why not. End of the world."

"Oh," said Inaba. "You never mentioned that before."

"When did I EVER mention this to you?" Ataru demanded. "When? WHEN?"

"Sorry," said the man. "Not you, I meant the other you, the..." He stopped and closed his mouth.

Ataru shook his head. "Go home, Inaba. You and Shinobu will be together. Go home. I promise this will work out."

"And no end of the world?"

Ataru thought for a moment. "Do you have any glue or tape?"

Inaba smiled. He reached into his rabbit costume and produced a roll of gray tape. He tossed this to Ataru.

"Don't leave home without it," he said and turned to leave.

"Don't you need to get back?" Ataru asked.

"Yeah, but the nearest doorway is up the next block."

Ataru shook his head as Inaba walked away.

"I know some very weird people," he told himself.

He stuck the tape in his jacket pocket, more aware now that his perspiration dripped down his back and arms. He wished he could remove the coat. He stuck the reel-gun under the jacket and skulked off down the alleyway after Inaba.

"All I need is something sticky and then I can tape this thing up and everything will be back to normal."

He walked on a little ways.

"Except that it won't," he thought.

Normal was school and chasing girls and his own room to himself. Normal was no electric shocks and eating beef bowls and not having a girl who thought she was his wife. Normal was no Lum, no Ten, no aliens or spirits or Inaba or... Normal was boring."

He jogged on, not knowing where he went, hoping fate would bring him another windfall. Ataru ran and he ran and he ran. More than once when he entered a store the manager chased him out again, either because the hardware store owner spread the word or because he played the game and had last every day. Ataru scanned every garbage can, searched every refuse pile and every dump. He poked around houses and open storage shacks, barrels, bins, boxes and gullies. At last he found himself a block from his own house. The charcoal smoke tickled his nose along with the scent of fish and rice and vegetables. He turned a corner and came to the empty lot where Cherry lived.

The little old monk sat before his fire grilling fish. Beside him sat a can. Even from the lot's edge Ataru could read the label - "Spray glue".

"'Tis fate," said Cherry. He stood just behind Ataru.

Ataru turned to face the little, ugly man. "Fate, hell. You planned all this."

"Plan. No. How could I plan all this."

"Then give me the can," demanded Ataru.

"Fate demands a payment, Morobashi Ataru."

"Yes! Sure! Your damned beef bowls. Whatever! Just give me the can."

"You think you can buy fate with a beef bowl? Hee hee hee hee. You are a stupid boy."

"What the hell do you want, you crazy old fraud? Huh?"

"'Tis fate, Morobashi Ataru. Ask yourself what you really want. You must choose now."

"Christ! Fate does not hang on a damned can of spray glue!" shouted Ataru.

"Yours does. What do you want and what will you pay? Think carefully."

"Shin..." the name died on Ataru's lips. He tried again. "Shino..."

No matter how hard Ataru tried to say Shinobu's name he could not spit it out. He could not have Shinobu. She belonged to Inaba now. He knew his choice: Lum or no Lum,. He chose.

"Give me the damned can."

"Hee hee hee hee. You have chosen. May fate have mercy on you, but you will rue the day you met Lum."

Cherry leaned over and took the can, then tossed it lot to Ataru.

"You will bring pickles with my beef bowls," Cherry shouted.

Ataru waved at the old man and jogged up the street. He removed the reel-gun from his jacket and coated the cup with glue, tossing the can away. He ran on, passing along the alleyways and yards where no one could see him, sneaking along Tomobiki until he came to the fateful street and the single lamp post. Ataru saw no one. Police guarded the tag area at night, but were crowded into a diner ignoring the lamp post. Ataru scaled the post, holding the reel-gun in his teeth as he did. He taped the gun to the post and then remained, looking down on the area.

"Tomorrow, I will fire the gun and start all this and I have no idea why I did it."

He slid down the post and when he touched the ground he removed the time device, turned the dials and hit one end. The door opened and Ataru fell through.


	6. Chapter 6

**Aikō-ka no ichibu**

**(Lovers Part)**

The stars were out in the present. Both Lum and Shinobu stood on the sidewalk waiting for Ataru to return. An "X" marked a spot on the pavement and both girls faced it. Ataru appeared behind them.

"Back here," Ataru told them. They turned around.

"Did you finish it?" asked Shinobu.

"Yes. It's finished and up on the post.

"Shinobu," said Lum. "Do you remember my top being ripped off, tcha?"

Shinobu face palmed. "Yes. I get it. It all happened."

"Not all of it," said Ataru. "Not yet."

"What do you mean?" demanded Shinobu. "What's left."

Ataru turned to Lum. "Which Morobashi am I now?"

"You're Morobashi-2, tcha."

Ataru nodded. He looked at Shinobu. She wore her school dress. Ataru set the timer on the time device and handed it to her.

"Lum, fly her up to the top of that pole. Shinobu, when you get there, first, don't fall off the pole, second, catch me before I fall, and third, tell me that I fixed one thing but If I don't fix everything else then none of this will happen."

"What do you mean? How will this fix anything?"

He nodded to Lum who flew the confused girl to her spot. When Shinobu vanished Lum landed again.

"So what happens now?" Ataru asked.

"Darling, you'll need to catch her when she comes back, tcha."

"Is that what the "X" is for?" he asked.

Lum nodded.

Ataru walked to the designated spot. Lum joined him.

"Darling, I need to talk to you later, when we get home, tcha."

"How old are you?" he asked.

"Darling, please."

"I just realized I never asked you how old you were. I just assumed you were seventeen, like me. You're not though, are you?"

"No," she said.

"Older?"

"Yes."

"How much?"

Lum shook her head. She floated up and away towards his house.

Ataru heard a pop like a light bulb breaking and Shinobu fell from the light post. Ataru caught her in his arms.

"Put me down!" she shouted.

Ataru set Shinobu down on her feet.

*SLAP!*

"What was that for?" Ataru asked.

"You dirty, lecherous pig. You caused all this. You and your girl chasing."

"I probably deserve that," Ataru said. "I'm sorry."

"What?" asked Shinobu.

"I'm sorry I did all those things."

Shinobu stood, staring at Ataru. The only body parts to move were her eyelids.

"Well... Yes. That's... better."

"You and Inaba will be happy."

Shinobu tilted her head and stared at Ataru. "Are you really Morobashi-2?"

He shrugged. "Sure, whatever that means."

Shinobu stepped towards Ataru and wrapped her arms around him in a tight embrace, holding him against her body. Ataru returned the embrace, but no more. Shinobu kissed him on his cheek, then let him go and stepped back.

"It's nice to meet you, Morobashi san. I should go now."

"Take care, Shinobu chan. Tell Inaba I said thank you, but that the world will end."

Shinobu gave him a strange look, then reached into her dress and removed the device. "Oh, take this," she said and tossed it back to him, then she walked up the street and disappeared around a corner.

"Good bye," he said.

Ataru worked hard that night, including fetching two beef bowls with pickles for Cherry and Sakura. When he arrived home his room clock showed one thirty in the morning. Lum waited for him, a purse-sized bag on the floor behind her.

"Darling, did you take care of everything, tcha?"

"Yes Lum. Is Ten here?"

"No, Darling. He's waiting on my UFO."

Lum crossed the room and wrapped her arms around Ataru. The boy stood still.

"What's going on?" he asked. "Why did I do all this?"

Lum let go. She stepped back and folded her hands.

"Please don't be mad, tcha. I did this because I love you."

"What did you do?"

"You asked me to come back here, to play tag with you. I didn't know why. The first game was really just because you asked."

"And the second one? With the mushrooms?"

"I was mad at you. I thought you would never love me, tcha."

"I love you. It's just that..."

Lum rolled her eyes. "Yes. I know, tcha. You're seventeen and you want to chase girls, tcha. That's the other reason you sent me back, tcha."

"To stop me from chasing girls?" Ataru asked. "Hee hee hee. No way. I would never do that."

"No! To stop you from chasing Shinobu, tcha."

Ataru smirked. "Because I would sweep her off her feet?"

"No, Darling. Because you wanted her to be with Inaba and she would have kept you away from... from me, tcha."

Ataru looked at the bag on the floor behind her.

"Where are you going? We can be together now."

I have to leave, Darling. I have to go back to my time, tcha."

"Why?"

"You sent me here to keep you safe from Shinobu. Shinobu has Inaba now. You're safe, so now I can go back home to you."

This confused Ataru. "But where are you now? Where is the other you?"

"We haven't met yet, Darling, tcha. We won't meet for a very long time, tcha."

"But all this. The last months. The last tag game. What was that?"

"Fate, tcha."

"Ah damnit! That's not how fate works."

Lum nodded.

"So what happens between now and when we meet? I just sit on my hands and wait for you?"

Lum shook her head. "No, Darling. You finish school. You meet girls. You go on dates. You fall in love and break your heart. There is University for you, and you get to make a great discovery, tcha."

"University? Don't make me laugh. I can't afford university."

"Darling, you are Morobashi Ataru, tcha. You saved the world from aliens twice, tcha. You get to go to university."

Ataru rolled his eyes in disbelief."Well, what discovery do I make? Can you tell me?"

Lum shrugged. "Yes. It is so complex it would be like telling you about magic. Do you remember, when I first asked to live with you?"

"How could I forget it? Perm and Chibi beat me pretty badly."

"Hmm-mm. You and your friends went on a space taxi ride and the driver charged you all the oil on Earth, tcha?"

"Sure. What of it?"

"It never seemed odd to you that I paid for the all of Earth's oil with a single energy cube, and the taxi drivers' union never bargained, tcha?"

Ataru frowned at the implication. "That's Oni stuff, right? You guys probably power your ships off those things."

Lum shook her head. "No Darling. That's Earth technology, tcha. YOU made it."

"I made it? Me?"

"Yes, you did Darling, tcha. You are – you will be – the great Morobashi Ataru, the richest man in the galaxy."

Ataru caught his breath. He thought about that for a moment, then shook the thoughts away.

"What about you?" he asked. "Where are you now?"

"I am on Oni now, finishing school, and soon I will travel the galaxy, tcha."

"When do we meet?"

"I can't tell you, tcha"

"Why not?"

"Because we might not meet. You told me time travel is tricky, even when you just travel the normal way, tcha. I can tell you I will never forget the first time I saw your face, tcha."

Ataru swallowed, or tied to. His dry mouth made swallowing impossible. "I want you to stay," he told her. "I think you should stay."

Lum's mouth curled into a tiny smile and shook her head. She picked up her bag and floated up to the sliding glass door, then turned and looked at Ataru.

"I can't wait to meet you," Ataru told her.

Lum drifted backwards away from Ataru, waving as she went. "Bye bye," she said. "Bye bye."


	7. Chapter 7

**Shōrai no seikatsu**

**(Life In The Future)**

Ataru loved the Martian evening. He strolled through the Mars Industries cafeteria, carrying a food tray with a beef bowl and a plate of taiyaki. Outside the giant windows, the vast red Martian landscape stretched away from horizon to horizon and the distant, pale sun cast long shadows across the red plains. To his left and to his right, employees stood and bowed as he walked past. Eating with his employees was point of honor for Ataru, even if it interrupted their meals.

Someone sat at his usual table, a large one near the windows. His entourage rushed forward to clear the interloper from the sacred spot, but the interloper did not move. Ataru walked around the table, standing on the opposite side.

"May I sit with you?" Ataru asked.

The person nodded a green-haired head and turned the page on a magazine he read. Ataru's entourage took seats around him and conversations resumed concerning the latest tests and changes to a giant mecha in development. Ataru listened to each proposal with care, eating as he did. Across from him the man read on in silence.

After finishing his reading the man stood up, folded the magazine under his arm and walked away without saying a word. One entourage member took the seat and the conversations resumed. Ataru shrugged and finished his food, then waited until the others finished before standing and leaving. On his way out he saw the man again and stopped to introduce himself.

"Hello, sir," he said. "I did not have a chance to say thank you for eating with me."

"It's all right," answered the man. "I am a stranger here. Thank you for letting me sit with you, Mr. Morobashi."

The man turned and left. Again Ataru shrugged. He returned to his office and the evening planning meetings.

"I met a stranger in the cafeteria," he told his secretary. "He knew who I was but no one seemed to know who he was."

His secretary, a short, skinny man with a perpetual worried look glanced through the digital calendar.

"He must be a member of the delegation here to see you."

"What delegation?" Ataru asked. "From where?"

"From the planet Oni. A group of royalty. They just showed up."

Something clicked in Ataru's head. He straightened up and brushed down his suit.

"Where are they. Please don't keep them waiting."

"Conference room B, sir. I believe they are having a meal."

Ataru walked away down the corridor. He could hear a party in conference room B. Growls, roars, banging and bashing sounds all spilled from the room even through the thick, oak doors. Ataru checked himself again and opened the door.

Inside were a dozen Oni, all in tiger-striped clothes, all eating, drinking and fighting with one another. They were all men. Ataru's heart sank, but he pulled himself up and stepped inside.

"Gentlemen, welcome to Mars. I am Morobashi Ataru, Owner and CEO. May I please join you."

The largest and fiercest Oni stood up, knocking his head on the ceiling. Ataru apologized for the oversight and rushed to the man's side just as his aids arrived to help him. Ataru offered to have his medical staff look at the Oni's head but the big man just laughed him off.

"My aides will take care of me," he said.

Six female Oni in full tiger-striped leotards stood next to the great man now, each holding a tray with some device on it, and each using their device to tend to him. The final aide held a tray with nothing on it. Ataru looked at the girl.

"What is it you do?" he asked.

The green-haired girl looked up at Ataru and smiled. "I provide an electric shock if the warload needs it, tcha."

Ataru cocked his head. he examined her face. Lum's face did not look back at him.

"What is your name?" he asked.

"Akari," said the girl.

Again, Ataru's heart sank and he showed it in his face.

"Were you expecting someone else, tcha?" she asked him.

"Ah, well... This is embarrassing. Do you know a girl named Lum?"

The six girls looked at each other and shook their heads.

"No sir, no one is named Lum."

"Oh," said Ataru.

The big Oni tapped Ataru on his shoulder.

"Why are you looking for Lum?" he asked.

"I - I met an Oni once named Lum. I wondered if she was with you."

"Lum? I think my pilot's name is Lum. She's down in my ship," he answered. "Would you like to meet her now?"

"Oh no. That won't be necessary," answered Ataru. "It can wait until after our dinner."

"Yes, dinner!" said the Oni and all of the other Oni raised a glass to toast.

The party lasted after midnight. Ataru left the broken room, a little tipsy and very happy. No one talked business quite like the Oni, and the business they talked made Ataru money. His own aides directed the removal of the passed-out Oni, ensuring their safe return to suites and rooms. Humans should not drink Oni wine, but toasts were inevitable and not drinking unthinkable. He wobbled a bit when he walked. On a whim he decided to visit the space dock and see if the ship's pilot, the one named Lum, was his Lum.

"My Lum?" he asked himself as he rode the elevator down to the ground level. "She hasn't been my Lum for decades." Then he thought again. "She was never my Lum."

He fell to remembering all the women in his life. Mamimi and Haru and Yuri and Kei. Many, many woman but somehow no woman worked out. Not because of Lum. He remembered Lum from childhood, but nothing more.

The elevator stopped at the ground level and Ataru crossed reception floor to the space hanger. A few technicians, dressed in the dusty-red jumpsuits of Mars Industries, stood around a tool box, drinking coffee. No one noticed Ataru arrive. Workers on this level did not know him.

"Can you men direct me to the Oni ship?" he asked.

"It would be the big tiger-striped one over on the far side," said a tech.

"Thank you," answered Ataru and started off across the city-sized space.

"It would be," added the tech, "But it left a while ago."

Ataru stopped. He turned and walked back.

"Do you know why it left? The Oni delegates are still here?"

"Well, you see, the Oni are fighters, and they have a sort of disagreement with another planet. The ship went to go to the front, probably."

"Is there anyone I can ask? I mean, ask where it went?"

The techs all looked at one another now. A younger man answered.

"I think I heard that the pilot stayed back here, on account of the Oni have a thing about sending girls into war."

Ataru beamed at the speaker. "That's great. Where is she?"

"She's complaining to her boss about being left back. They're in that room, over there."

Ataru looked towards the room. Bright flashes sent stark shadows out across the hanger floor. Ataru mistook the light for an arch welding torch, but now he heard the once familiar Oni language spoken very, very loud.

Ataru jogged towards the room. When he arrived he saw a girl standing in the room's center, shouting at an Oni three times her size, lightning shooting from her hands. Ataru stepped in and the green haired beauty turned towards him and let loose a bolt that lifted him off his feet and slammed him into the wall.

The world went dark.


	8. Chapter 8

**Anata wa (shinai) o kaishi suru koto ga dekiru**

**(You May (Not) Begin)**

Someone slapped Ataru.

"Wake up, tcha," a female voice said. "Wake up!"

Ataru forced his eyes open. There stood Lum, not a single day older than when he had last seen her.

"Lum?" he asked. "Is that you?"

"Idiot. I don't know you, tcha." she shouted and stood up. "These humans are so fragile, tcha."

She addressed the last remark to her superior, the great hulking Oni standing like like a quarter-sized model of a Mars Industries mecha next to a half-assembled rocket engine..

"Are you all right, sir?" asked the big Oni.

"Yes. I'm fine," answered Ataru, and without question he did feel fine. He felt a little younger now that Lum stood in the room.

"Miss," Ataru said to Lum.

Lum dismissed him with turning around. "Look, I'm sorry I zapped you, tcha."

"Technical sergeant Lum," shouted the big Oni. "This is Morobashi Ataru, the creator of the energy cube.

Lum turned, big eyed and pale, to look at Ataru. She knelt by his side and in a very sweet, soft voice said "Oh damn! I – I'm sorry. Please forgive me, tcha?"

Ataru smiled up at her "It's all right," he said, "I'm okay."

Lum smirked. She turned back to the big Oni. "Ha ha ha! This one isn't so bright, tcha," then she turned back to Ataru. "I don't care who you are. Don't. Get. In. My. Way."

The big Oni flushed red from bare chest to his green hair. He stepped forward, putting himself between Lum and Ataru.

"Technical sergeant! I am placing you on report for insubordination and threatening a friendly non-combatant. As the warlord's acting enforcer on Mars, I relieve you of your post – indefinitely. " He turned to Ataru. "Sir, do you wish to have Technical Sergeant Lum turned over to the local authorities for further punishment?"

"No!" answered Ataru, then, after a second's thought he said "Yes! Yes. Assign her to me as my aide."

The big Oni's mouth curled into a giant smile, baring teeth only a shark could love.

"Technical Sergeant Lum, you are now on permanent assignment to Mars as Morobashi Ataru's aide."

Lum stamped her boots on the steel deck and a blue electrical field formed around her.

"Arrrrrggghhhh! You can't do this, tcha!" shouted Lum. "I'm a pilot, damnit, tcha! You can't strand me down here with these stupid... stupid – humans, tcha!" she turned to Ataru and glared. "You tell him to take me back or I'll fry you, tcha."

Ataru grinned. He knew what his line would be.

"I'll say it on my deathbed," he told her.

She reached out a crackling finger to Ataru and shook it into his grinning face.

"I'll make you say it if it's the last thing I do, tcha!"

Lum floated from the room. After she left and her field's blue glow faded from view, the big Oni smiled at Ataru. "Are you sure about this, sir?" he asked. "T.S. Lum has quite the temper."

"I know," answered Ataru. "So do I. I think we'll get on just fine."

"Well," said the Oni, "On your head be it. Good luck."

Ataru nodded to the big man and followed Lum from the hanger.


End file.
